Yearly Archives: 2013

Commentary and analysis of recent political events

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There’s a special edition of BBC Question Time tonight from Johannesburg, South Africa. I hope that somebody will discuss the real legacy of Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress: that South Africa is still an Apartheid state. The clearest indicator of this is the massacre of 34 striking miners at Marikana. 

Nelson Mandela: The Reluctant Revolutionary is an article about the South African campaign for liberation. It discusses the Apartheid regime and the history of Nelson Mandela, the ANC and anti-apartheid campaigning. It recognises that the ANC leadership was repeatedly a moderating force opposed to radical campaigning while simultaneously claiming that it had organised that same radical campaigning. Recommended.

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Firefighters launch fresh strikes over pension changes

Firefighters in England and Wales are to launch a fresh wave of strikes in their long-running row with the government over pensions.

Members of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) will walk out for four hours from 6pm on Friday, and again from the same time on Saturday, with the threat of further action in the new year.

One brigade urged Christmas partygoers to buy takeaway food during the strike rather than try to cook at home if drunk.

FBU members have gone on strike four times in recent months in protest against changes to pensions and their retirement age. The union argues that older firefighters face losing their jobs if they fail fitness tests as part of changes to the pension age from 55 to 60.

The general secretary, Matt Wrack, said: “It’s now been almost two months since the government has been willing to meet us for negotiations despite several invitations from us.

“Until they do, and until they start to actually resolve the dispute, we’ll keep up the pressure for the sake of public safety and our members’ pensions.

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‘UK’s stale energy market makes it easy for Big Six to hike prices,’ says new study

Image of an electricity pylon tree…

Six years ago Britain had the healthiest record among all major developed economies for people shopping around for the cheapest prices, but the country has badly slipped down international league tables. While 21 per cent were changing companies in 2006, just 11.5 per cent have changed this year (including estimates for December). This is partly because the Big Six stopped door-step selling in the second half of 2011 after a series of fines for misleading customers.

The figures will fuel suspicions the Big Six firms, which have all hiked their prices significantly above inflation in recent weeks while announcing huge profits, are taking advantage of the problems people experience in changing provider.

Prime Minister David Cameron has urged customers to switch to better deals – but many find the process difficult and time-consuming.

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EU migrants face 100 new questions to make it harder to obtain benefits

Image of protest. Placard reads 'Stop blaming the Romanians for your failures!"

Income-related benefits such as housing benefit, income support and council tax benefit are to be harder for EU migrants to obtain from Friday as they face a string of 100 questions, including the reasons they were unable to find a job in their home country. They will also be asked about their ability to speak English.

The new 100 questions in the fresh habitual residence test is being rushed out ahead of the transitional controls on Romanians and Bulgarians being lifted on 1 January.

The European Union insists on the free movement of workers within the EU, but the government believes it is legally entitled to ask tougher questions of migrants before they are entitled to make benefit claims.

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Revised UK welfare sanctions mean more punishment for the poor

Job Seekers Allowance (JSA) and Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) sanctions are set to put many Britons in “dire financial conditions,” according to the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB).

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The report [https://skydrive.live.com/view.aspx?resid=CB5ED957FE0B849F!350&app=WordPdf&wdo=2&authkey=!AJTbB-gzwsSCayQ], published in October 2013 by the Manchester CAB on behalf of the Greater Manchester Citizens Advice Bureaux Cluster Group, is an in-depth evaluation of the impact of the sanctions. It describes benefit sanctions as “financial penalties” that are driving people already in devastating financial crisis even further into dire conditions. They raise concerns about the increase in the number of clients they had seen in relation to these sanctions.

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Although the majority of the respondents were sanctioned for four weeks, one third had been given 10 week sanctions, with the average duration working out at eight weeks.

Two thirds had been left with no income. Twenty-three percent who had sanctions imposed had children, and 10 percent were lone parents.

Eighty percent of respondents borrowed money from family and friends, 8 percent borrowed from banks and 9 percent from pay day loan companies, which charge astronomical annual percentage rates.

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The sanctions described in the CAB report are part of £21.8 billion in welfare cuts being imposed by the Conservative/Liberal government. Last month Prime Minister David Cameron declared that austerity cuts would be made permanent, meaning that escalating numbers of people will join the many already struggling to put food on the table, to find shelter and afford necessities like heating and lighting.

US drone strike in Yemen kills 15

At least 15 people were killed yesterday in central Yemen, when missiles fired from an unmanned US drone slammed into a wedding convoy. Yemeni security officials said the attack took place near the city of Radda, the capital of Bayda province, leaving behind charred bodies and burnt out vehicles.

No names and few details have been released. The CIA and US military, which are responsible for the criminal program of targeted assassinations in Yemen, Pakistan and other countries, have made no statement.

Yemeni security officials have provided conflicting accounts of the attack. “An air strike missed its target and hit a wedding car convoy,” one official told Reuters. “Ten people were killed immediately and another five who were injured died after being admitted to the hospital.” Another five people were injured. No attempt was made to explain what the real target was, or why “a mistake” was made.

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I’m going to suggest some worthwhile causes for donations here.

< more may appear here >

I am willing to receive anonymous donations or bequests. Bequests are ok because I can’t serve or be seen to serve somebody who is dead. It’s – of course – up to you to decide if I’m a worthy cause or not. I’m advised that used, unmarked notes are a good way to ensure anonymity.

Image of a Hunter 19 sailing boat

What I’d really like is a small sailing boat – something that I can learn to sail in but that can also be sailed long distances single-handedly. A nice Hunter 19 sailing boat (like this one [25/12/13 I’ve come to realise that this is far from an ideal trailer-sailer because of that fin keel and would avoid it. Imagine trying to launch that from a launching ramp. The one in the image above is fine.]) with outboard, etc on a trailer would be ideal and not too expensive. A Hunter 19 has crossed the Atlantic. I’m sure that it could be delivered anonymously on a trailer.

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Politics news allsorts

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Commentary and analysis of recent UK politics events

Image of GCHQ donught buildingFollowing Home Secretary Theresa May’s refusal to allow MI5 boss Andrew Parker to appear before the parliamentary home affairs select committee the committee has said that it will question Theresa May more thoroughly.

The issue is about oversight of the security services: the home affairs select committee consider that intelligence agencies should be answerable to parliament and ordinary MPs, the government and the Home Secretary do not. Tim Farron, President of the ‘Liberal-Democrats’ is to propose measures to improve scrutiny of the intelligence services at the ‘Liberal-Democrats’ spring conference. The ‘Liberal-Democrat’ leadership has previously ignored directions from their ‘liberal-democratic’ party e.g. student tuition fees.

The public accounts committee has commented on Chancellor George Osborne use of misleading statistics on Britain’s budget deficit.

PAC chair Margaret Hodge said it was “hard to understand why the government debt and deficit highlighted in the whole government accounts differ from those reported in the ONS’s national accounts.”

“According to the former document, compiled on the basis of well-understood accounting standards, the UK’s in-year deficit for 2011-12 was £185bn. The national accounts used by the chancellor put the figure at £90bn.”

George Osborne has said that he wants “billions” more cut from the welfare budget. George Eaton at the New Statesman speculates where the axe might fall:

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What cuts could he have in mind? It’s worth looking back at the speech David Cameron made on the subject in June 2012 when he outlined a series of possible measures, including:

  • The restriction of child-related benefits for families with more than two children.
  • A lower rate of benefits for the under-21s.
  • Preventing school leavers from claiming benefits.
  • Paying benefits in kind (like free school meals), rather than in cash.
  • Reducing benefit levels for the long-term unemployed. Cameron said: “Instead of US-style time-limits – which remove entitlements altogether – we could perhaps revise the levels of benefits people receive if they are out of work for literally years on end”.
  • A lower housing benefit cap. Cameron said that the current limit of £20,000 was still too high.
  • The abolition of the “non-dependent deduction”. Those who have an adult child living with them would lose up to £74 a week in housing benefit.

Osborne would also likely reduce the household benefit cap of £26,000 (he said today that “future governments could change the level” and Tory MPs have been pushing for one of £20,000) and maintain the 1% cap on benefit increases (a real-terms cut).

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G4S and Serco are to have their criminals’ electronic tagging contracts transferred to Crapita.

New Statesman has a guide to fast-track processing of asylum-seekers.

 

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Politics news allsorts featuring Tory paedos news

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Image of CGHE documentThere is a story developing – which has had surprisingly little attention – that five Tory MPs including one ex-minister are being investigated for paedophile crimes against boys. The source of the story is exaro news while slightly different reports appear in the daily record and ibtimes. The former cabinet minister is described as a household name. What does that mean?

Home Secretary Theresa May has blocked the appearance of the MI5 boss Andrew Parker at the home affairs select committee. Parker was to appear to justify his claim that the Guardian has risked national security by publishing the whistleblower Edward Snowden. Parker’s claims continue to be unsupported by any evidence.

 

[17/12/13 I think I know who and hardly a household name unless made in … is what is meant by a household name …]

 

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Politics news allorts

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Commentary and analysis on recent UK politics events.

Fidel Castro peers out of the bars of Nelson Mandela's former cell on Robben Island during a recent visit.
Fidel Castro peers out of the bars of Nelson Mandela’s former cell on Robben Island during a recent visit.

There’s a very good article about the sanitization through political values of Nelson Mandela and the South African campaign against Apartheid at politics.co.uk. I’ll quote some but urge you to read the whole article.

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For decades, Cuba supported the armed struggle liberation movements in South Africa, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Angola and Mozambique. In 1961, when Che Guevara attended a summit in Geneva as industry minister, he attacked “the inhuman and fascist policy of apartheid” and demanded the expulsion of South Africa from the UN, all decades before Britain could bring itself to challenge the racist government.

The climax of the decades-long campaign came when Cuba supported liberation forces in Angola against South African interference. In the 1988 battle of Cuito Cuanvale, a victory celebrated across southern Africa, South African soldiers were defeated a volunteer Cuban army , dragging PW Botha and FW de Klerk to the negotiating table.

Mandela described Cuba as “our friend”, a country which “helped us train our people, who gave us resources that helped us so much in our struggle”. He added: “The defeat of the racist army at Cuito Cuanavale has made it possible for me to be here today. What other country can point to a record of greater selflessness than Cuba has displayed in its relations with Africa? For the Cuban people internationalism is not merely a word but something that we have seen practiced to the benefit of large sections of humankind.”

When challenged on his friendship with Castro by Clinton, Mandela replied: “We should not abandon those who helped us in the darkest hour in the history of this country.”

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Welfare reforms cut food budgets to as low as £20 a week – survey

Low-income households spend an average of £2.10 per person per day on groceries, having cut their daily food budget drastically since the summer, according to the latest instalment of a survey on the impact of welfare reform.

The detailed survey of more than 87 families found that a third said they now spent less than £20 a week on food, partly to cope with spiralling gas and electricity bills, while more than half said they had no money left once bills were paid.

A combination of shrinking incomes and rising living costs, coupled with high personal debts meant the “reality of everyday life has got tougher” for low-income families since April when a series of welfare changes, such as the bedroom tax, were introduced, the report said.

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Former spy chief quits Cambridge college ahead of Iraq war revelations

Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6, has resigned as Master of Pembroke College, ahead of the potential release of his account of the events leading to the Iraq war

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Sources close to Dearlove have spoken about how he feels Chilcot should recognise the role played by Blair and his spokesman Alastair Campbell in the reports which suggested Saddam could use chemical weapons to target British troops in Cyprus – a claim which put Britain on a path to war in Iraq.

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